Scotus Academicus, Tomus quartus: De Angelis

Three things above all come to be determined in the present Question: First, whether created angels could have been entirely impeccable; Second, whether they could have sinned in the first instant of their creation; Third, whether they sinned led by some necessity, or by fully free will; and so that these may be resolved more clearly,

Note 1. That no pure creature does in fact exist, or ever existed, impeccable by its nature, and intrinsically so; for every intellectual creature is either angelic or human; but it is certain that both were defiled by sin. Whence it is deservedly said in Job 4: Behold those who serve him are not steadfast, and he found perversity in his angels: how much more those who dwell in houses of clay! As if he would say, says S. Gregory there;

if those Spirits which are weighed down by no infirmity of flesh cannot be immutable, with what rashness do men think that they can remain steadfastly in good, whom, as to that in which intellect lifts them to the highest things, the burdening infirmity of flesh impedes, so that through the vice of corruption they have within themselves that from which they may grow old away from their inner newness!

The only difficulty, therefore, is whether by the absolute power of God there could be formed some rational creature which of itself, and by its nature, would be altogether indefectible.

For the resolution of which difficulty, two most opposed opinions obtain; the First of which contends that it is not repugnant for some rational creature to be impeccable from within. So thinks Ocham in book 1. dist. 44. q. unica art. 1., where he supposes that a man far more essentially perfect than the one who was created could exist, and consequently that such a one could have been produced impeccable by his nature. But there are those who derive the manner of this impeccability from the fact that they think some creature could be produced to whom the beatific vision would be connatural, which, they say, makes a man impeccable by his nature. There are also those who wish the manner of this impeccability to be deduced from the fact that it is not repugnant for a rational creature to be produced by God not free, but determined by necessity to one thing, and consequently unable to sin; since since it could not naturally be determined to evil, it follows that it would be formally determined to good by its nature. The Second opinion, however, denies that a creature can be produced which is intrinsically impeccable, both in natural matter and in supernatural, so that whether left to its nature, or raised to the supernatural order, it could sin.

Note 2. In truth the Angel was not a sinner in the first instant of his creation, since, as we taught above, all Angels were created in the state of sanctifying grace, whence in the Lateran Council under Innocent III it is determined that the devil, and the other demons were indeed created good in nature by God, but made themselves evil by their own act. And in the Fourth Council of Carthage cap. 4., among the other dogmas of faith to be asked of him who is created Bishop, one is whether he believes that the devil was made evil not by condition, but by will. Hence Origen homily on Ezechiel: The Serpent, he says of the devil, was not always a serpent; first indeed created good by God, but made a demon by the own perversity of his will. To this S. Chrysostom accords on the patience of Job: The devil, he says, was not made a devil from the beginning, but an Angel was created. To these accords saint Augustine in many places, especially book 1. De nuptiis et concupiscentiis cap. 23.: The devil, he says, is an unclean spirit, certainly because he is a spirit by nature, unclean by vice: that he is a spirit, is good; and evil, that he is unclean: of which two the former is from God, this from himself. Whence in the book De Civit. c. 13. he says: Nor is even the nature of the devil itself evil, insofar as it is nature; but perversity makes it evil.

— This truth also can be strengthened by reason: for if the demons had been created evil, they would not seem worthy of punishment on account of such evil; for in those things which are from nature, no one is to be judged worthy either of reward or of punishment: then because it would follow that God is the principal Author of such malice: (for indeed he who gives the form gives naturally the consequences consequent upon the form: but that formal malice would follow upon such a nature, as is supposed: therefore it would proceed principally from the Author of such a nature:) then finally because God himself in Genesis 1. approved all the works founded by him as perfect, and good: For God saw all things that he had made, and they were very good. Add that for the assertion of this truth the words of the Apostle Jude suffice, saying: The angels who did not keep their principality, but left their own habitation, have been reserved unto the judgment of the great day in everlasting chains under darkness. They are not, therefore, evil by nature, but have been made so by their own will.

It remains, therefore, to determine whether the Angels in the first instant of their creation could truly have sinned. The Thomists deny this with the Angelic Doctor, prima parte q. 63. art. 5. The Subtle Doctor, however, affirms it in book 2. dist. 5. q. 2. n. 13.

Note 3. That since the Angels could not have been good without free will and its right use with the aid of grace, God not only founded the Angels endowed with liberty, but also infused into them grace whereby they might persevere in good if they willed, so that according to S. Augustine lib. 12. De Civit. Dei, cap. 9. he simultaneously founded in them nature and infused grace. For there was not, as we said, reason why the conferring of grace should be deferred, which was necessary to them for attaining the end for which they were created, and toward which they ought to tend. Yet that grace, although it brought them great light of intellect, nevertheless did not so determine the will to good that they would will and do only what it was just for them to will and do. Therefore it was given to them to persevere if they willed, but not to will to persevere: which would plainly have followed, if God had operated in them and willed to bring it to completion. S. Augustine explains this excellently in the book De correptione et gratia cap. 10.:

Most wholesomely, he says, we confess*, what we believe most rightly, that God, the Lord of all things, who created all things very good, and foresaw that evils would arise from goods, and knew that it pertains more to his most omnipotent goodness even to bring good out of evils, than not to permit evils to be: so ordered the life of angels and men, that in it he might first show what free will could do, then what the benefit of his grace and the judgment of justice could do. Finally certain angels, whose prince is he who is called the devil, were made fugitives from the Lord God by free will: yet fleeing, they could not escape his goodness, by which they were blessed, > nor his judgment, by which they were made most miserable. The rest, however, stood in the truth by that same free will.

By which words S. Augustine openly teaches that all Angels, both good and evil, were from the beginning endowed with the fullest liberty, and that the evil ones were turned away from God most freely: but that the good ones stood in truth and observance by their own will strengthened and illumined by actual grace. Whether, however, the demons went astray by some persuading and morally impelling cause to sin, will here have to be determined.

First conclusion. — In truth no rational creature can be produced which by its nature, and intrinsically, is impeccable. So the Doctor in book 2. dist. 23. q. unica num. 6., where he says: I say therefore, to the question, that such a nature cannot be made, or will, which is impeccable by nature: because the authorities of the Saints are express on this point.

He proves the conclusion, therefore, first by the authority of S. Jerome, Epistle 118. near the end, where, weighing those words of Ps. 142. No living being shall be justified in thy sight, he says:

He does not say every man, but every living being, that is, not the Evangelist, not the Apostle, not the Prophet: I ascend to greater things, not the Thrones, not the Dominations, not the Powers, nor the rest of the Virtues: God alone is he into whom sin does not fall; the rest, since they are of free will, can bend their will in either direction.

S. Augustine teaches the same opinion in book 3. contra Maximinum cap. 12., where from those words of 1. to Timothy 6. in which it is said of God, Who alone has immortality, he concludes that God also alone has impeccability; for men and angels die in some way by sinning: And all, he says, who have not sinned, could have sinned, and to whatever rational creature it is granted that it cannot sin, this is not of its proper nature, but of the grace of God. — S. Gregory declares the matter expressly in book 5. Moral. cap. 27. The Angelic nature, he says, even if by contemplating its Author in adhering to him it remains immutably in its state; yet by that very fact that it is a creature, it has within itself vicissitude of mutability. But S. Anselm defines the matter most evidently of all in book 2. Cur Deus homo cap. 10., where to the Disciple asking him why God could not make a creature impeccable by nature, he answers: Because he could not make it God: therefore (the Doctor subjoins) no creature can be impeccable unless it be God, or assumed by the Word.

The Doctor proves the same truth by a twofold argument; the first of which he forms thus: every will which can appetate its own advantage, and rightly not appetate it, can sin: but there is no created will, nor creatable, which cannot appetate its own advantage, and rightly not appetate it: therefore likewise there is none which is not defectible. The major stands: for by that very fact that the will, in appetating its own advantage, can omit the affect of justice and rectitude, or not appetate that advantage on account of an honest end prescribed by God, it can sin; for sin is nothing else than the lack of rectitude due to an act. The Doctor proves the minor: every will in which those two things are not necessarily joined, namely, to appetate advantage, and to appetate it rightly: can appetate that good advantage rightly, and not rightly: but in no created will can those be necessarily joined; namely, that in appetating its own good advantage, it necessarily appetates it rightly: for no will besides the divine appetates rightly formally from the fact that it appetates: therefore, etc. The Major is plain: for if those two things are not necessarily connected, namely, to appetate advantage, and to appetate it rightly, it is evident that the will will be able to appetate advantage good for itself, and not appetate it rightly. The Doctor proves the Minor: every created will, just as it can appetate advantage for itself, so can it appetate it in a manner not fitting to itself according to the divine ordination; for it could will that advantage in such a way that it would appear to itself to be a greater advantage: so it could appetate and will supreme beatitude, the supreme and greatest of all; because it is better to have supreme beatitude than to have it in a remiss degree: but that appetitus would not be conformable to the divine ordination: because by the prescription of God beatitude must be commensurated to merits: therefore there is no created will which cannot of itself will something against the will of God; and accordingly there is none which cannot sin. — He confirms it: every will which is not its own rule, nor is necessarily conformis to its rule, can fall short of its rectitude: but every created will, if left to its nature, neither is its own rule, nor conformis to its rule: therefore, etc. The major stands: for surely every will which neither is its own rule, nor is conformis to its rule, will without doubt be able to be difform to it; and therefore will not be right, nor accordingly have due rectitude in its acts, and hence will sin: since sin, as we soon said, is nothing else than the lack of due rectitude in acts freely elicited by the will. The minor also is evident; for no created will can be its own rule, since it necessarily has a will superior to itself, namely the divine, on which it depends, and by which it must be regulated: nor is it necessarily conformis to it; inasmuch as it is supposed free, and therefore can will something against the divine will, or at least will in another manner, and another thing on account of an end: therefore, etc.

Proof 2. Every will which is not satiated by love of any object, and which has not necessarily, but by proposal, the infinite good by which it can be satiated, can whenever it pleases cease from any object whatsoever which it loves, and love some objects not in order to that infinite satiating good: but no created will is of itself satiated by love of any object; nor does it have proposed to it necessarily the infinite good always by which alone it can be satiated: therefore every created will can when it pleases cease from love of any object whatsoever which it loves, and love some objects without relation of them to the infinite satiating object: but every will which can do this can sin; because it can cease from love of some object, even when it would be commanded: therefore every created will can sin, and consequently none is of itself impeccable. He notes also that by this reasoning the second and third proof of Alexander of Hales can be confirmed.

This conclusion could be proven further; because to that extent a non-sinnable rational will could be given; either because it would be determined by its nature to pursue any good proposed, such that it would not be free to it to cease from pursuit: or because it would be determined to honest good as such, such that it could not pursue any good other than honest good, although from those very honest goods it could by its freedom choose this before that, just as the will of the Blessed is de facto determined.

But neither of these can be said. Not the first, because then the will would not be free: and moreover, because if it were determined to any good proposed, it ought also to be determined in the same manner to flee any evil proposed: but this is inconvenient: because it would follow that the intellect ought not to have the power of proposing simultaneously good, and evil, nor two goods toward which the will could not tend simultaneously, or two evils; since, inasmuch as the will would be determined to one, the other would be proposed in vain simultaneously, and such a faculty of the intellect would be given in vain. Nor yet the second; because it is absurd that there be any appetite which cannot tend toward any good of its own: but it is impossible that there could be any created will which could not have a good other than the honest: for it is impossible that there be any vital power which does not have some delectable object: therefore it is impossible that it be determined solely to honest good intrinsically by its own nature.

You will say 1. God can make a body which cannot be disordered from its motion, as is the heaven, which naturally cannot be moved otherwise than it is in fact moved: therefore he can make a spirit which cannot be disordered from its motion, and consequently it will be impeccable. — The Doctor answers, denying the antecedent, if we speak of a body according to its intrinsic nature: for without doubt any body whatsoever can be impeded from any motion, at least divinely, and moved by a motion wholly distinct, and opposed. Then, although the antecedent were true, the consequence can be denied: for there is the difference that such a body, since it is devoid of liberty, and cannot be partaker of fault as the will is, could not even be disordered in its motion by a culpable disorder: but not so the will, which since it is endowed with free will, and can have motion not only about one object but also about another, does not need necessarily to have one over the other, and consequently if only motion toward one of them, as toward honest good, be a right and ordered motion of it, it will be able to be disordered from that motion by having another motion toward advantageous good not honest, which motion is inordinate.

You will say 2. God can make some will which tends necessarily toward some good, for instance toward an end; therefore he will be able to make it that such a will tend toward everything ordered to that end: therefore, etc. The antecedent is plain through Aug. book 13. De Trinit. cap. 3., who says, That all will beatitude necessarily. The consequence is proven, because with the same necessity by which something tends toward an end, it tends toward those things which are toward the end. — The Doctor answers, first according to his principles, that a created will does not tend necessarily toward the end shown to it; neither in particular, nor in universal: therefore he denies the antecedent with its proof. — He answers secondly according to the common opinion, granting the antecedent, denying the consequence: for the account is different concerning the last end, and the means ordered to it; for in the last end, since it is infinite good, there is most perfect goodness attracting the will to love of it, but there is not such an account of good in the means ordered to it. The Doctor adds that although such a will would tend necessarily toward the end, it would not thence follow that it ought to tend toward the means in the due mode, and consequently it does not thence follow that it cannot sin.

You will say 3. To be able to sin according to S. Anselm is not liberty nor a part of it: therefore true liberty can exist without the power of sinning: and accordingly God will be able to produce some will altogether impeccable.

The Doctor answers first, explaining S. Anselm, and distinguishing the antecedent: to be able to sin, that is, to be able to produce that act by which one is sinful, or the privation in which the formal account of the sin itself is supposed to consist, grants the antecedent: to be able to sin, that is, to be able to produce the sin itself in that instant in which one is sinful, denies the antecedent: and similarly he distinguishes the first consequence, and denies the second consequence.

The Doctor answers secondly, distinguishing the antecedent otherwise: to be able to sin is not so of the essence of liberty even created, that the concept of liberty cannot be had without the concept of such a power, grants: because one can consider the power as able to choose one good over another at its pleasure, and this concept is of it as it is free, and sufficiently distinctive of it from natural power: to be able to sin is not of the essence of created liberty of itself, such that it would not belong by its intrinsic nature to any created free power: denies the antecedent.

You will say 4. God can make a will impeccable by grace, and glory, as is plain in the Blessed, and those confirmed in grace: therefore also by nature: because God can communicate to some creature every finite perfection altogether, identifying it really to her: but that perfection which the state of beatitude has, of confirmation in grace, by reason of which the will becomes impeccable, is a finite perfection: therefore he can identify it to the will: but the will to which it were identified would without doubt be as impeccable as the will of the Blessed, and of one confirmed in grace.

It is confirmed. that what does not repugn to some creature can be co-created with it, and consequently can be connatural to it: but grace, and charity are not opposed to rational creature: therefore they can be connatural to it.

I answer first. by denying the major: for, as we said in the Disputation on the Beatific Vision, there is no creatable spiritual substance to which the beatific Vision would be connatural. The same must be said of grace and charity, and shortly afterwards the confirmation too must be denied.

The Doctor answers secondly. by denying the consequence together with the major of his proof: for God cannot bring it about that any substance, e.g., should have formal heat identified with itself, or that any created intellect should have intellection or the beatific Vision: hence although He could make an intellect more perfect to infinity, yet He could never make it so that any finite thing would really be grace, or that an intellect would be intellection.

You will say 5. A created will is impeccable in the first instant of its creation: because for that instant it has the natural rectitude given to it by God, and a natural motion, and consequently one naturally and necessarily right: but God can conserve a creature for any other instant in the same state in which it was first formed: therefore it could always be impeccable of itself.

The Doctor answers first. by denying the antecedent, whose falsity will be evident from the following Conclusion. The Doctor answers secondly. according to the doctrine of St. Thomas, by denying that that creature ought to be conserved in subsequent instants in the same state in which it was in the first, because for other instants it connaturally requires having operations imputable to itself from itself, and not necessarily imputable to God: but in the first instant all its operations are necessarily imputed to God; consequently, according to that opinion, it cannot have an evil operation for the first instant.

You will say finally. It does not imply a contradiction that a created will be determined necessarily to following the dictate of reason, and therefore God can produce such a will: for whatever does not imply a contradiction can be done by God: but a will following the dictate of reason necessarily is impeccable of itself: therefore, etc. The minor is evident. The major is proved: the voluntary appetite can be determined to the dictate of reason whether right or erroneous, just as the sensitive appetite is determined to the dictate of formal or virtual sense: therefore there can be an appetite determined to the dictate of reason, such that it could not go against the dictate of reason, and yet could freely tend toward diverse objects according to the dictate of reason; namely, when reason dictated several goods and did not prefer one to another, then the will could freely choose one of these and let go another, nor would it sin in this; since indeed it would not act against the dictate of reason.

I deny the major. and to its proof I say that in that case neither the will nor the dictate of reason would have the perfect ratio of will and dictate; just as, for example, if God concurred with someone's intellect only for understanding goods, and not for understanding evils; then the will would necessarily will goods and not evils: yet that determination of the will would not be from within, but from without; but the present question concerns the determination of the will from within.

Second conclusion. — The angel was able to sin in the first instant. So the Doctor in 2. dist. 5. q. 2. num. 13. I hold, therefore, he says, that he could in the first instant have a perfect volitive power, and was not limited to right operation: for he did not have in the second instant any more determining principle than in the first: therefore, etc.

This reasoning of the Doctor can be elucidated thus: a power which can have a perfect operation, and is not limited nor determined necessarily to right operation, can have a non-right operation: but the angel in the first instant of his creation had a perfect volitive power; and therefore he could have a perfect volition; and he was not limited nor determined to right operation: therefore in that instant he could operate non-rightly, and consequently sin. The consequence is most good, with an evident major. I prove the minor: because the will of the angel in the first instant did not have any greater determination than in the second; since it has nothing real and intrinsic in the first which it does not have in the second: therefore, etc.

Secondly. The will in the first instant of creation, prior in nature to sinning, could have all the conditions required for acting and eliciting a sinful act: therefore it truly could sin for that instant. The antecedent is proved: no other conditions are desired for sinning than knowledge of the object under the ratio of a good that is useful or delectable, and prohibited, and the negation of every impediment: but all those things can be in the first instant. Proof: those things which are in the second instant can be in the first apart from the respect to pre-existing being. but that respect contributes nothing at all to the matter: therefore what is required for sinning in the second instant can be in the first.

Proof 3. The angel in the first instant could merit and have everything required for meriting: indeed, as the Thomists confess, they in fact merited: therefore also to sin and to have all the prerequisites for sinning: both because the reason is entirely the same; and because if he could not sin, he could not merit, since whatever prevents him from being able to sin prevents him from being able to merit: indeed more is required for meriting than for demeriting: for to merit is a certain perfect good, but to demerit is an evil: whereas good comes from an integral cause, and evil from any defect whatsoever.

It is confirmed. Hence if the angel had not had in the first instant what was necessary for sinning, it would be because he would not have been perfectly and completely free: but he was sufficiently free so as to be able to sin. Proof: in order that the angel in the instant of his creation could have sinned, it suffices that he was free with the liberty of contradiction and of exercise: but he had at least this liberty in the first instant of creation: therefore he could have sinned in it. Proof of the major: the angel in the first instant of his creation was bound by divine precept to elicit an act of love of God above all things: but since he was free as to exercise with respect to the aforementioned love, he could then not love, or omit that love, especially since God could then deny him efficacious help for eliciting it: for the conferral of this help was not owed to him, but entirely liberal and gratuitous: therefore then the angel could sin at least by the sin of omission: for to be able to sin by the sin of omission is to be able not to elicit the act to which one is bound by precept, or to be able to omit that act.

The Thomists reply with Cajetan. That the angel in the first instant could not omit the act: because, the precept remaining on the part of God concerning the eliciting of such an act by the angel, e.g., that conversion be made to God, there was impressed upon him by the Author of nature a judgment: which indeed could only be a true practical judgment about doing what is commanded by God: and accordingly the will could not act contrariwise, nor cease from the act; and yet was no less free on that account. This they explain by the example of Christ the Lord, who with respect to the act falling under precept was free as to exercise: and yet could not sin: whence although he could elicit that act with antecedent power, and in the divided sense, nevertheless not with consequent power, and in the composite sense. They add that the angels in the first instant could incur the omission of the act, but not the sin of omission: because although they could omit such an act, insofar as omission is a pure negation of the opposite act, nevertheless not as it is the privation of the said act, as of something owed and commanded by God.

Against this, first. this response supposes as certain that a pure culpable omission is not possible, which nevertheless is disputed among theologians: very many of whom affirm that the simple omission of that precept which one is bound to fulfill is sinful: since indeed at that time when the precept obliges to loving God, e.g., or to hearing the sacred rite on Sunday, one can, by reason of some culpable negligence, be merely negatively disposed regarding that act, so that he elicits no act of will by which he positively wills not to love God or to be present at the sacred rite; which negligence will be altogether culpable, seeing that for omission to be a sin it is enough that the negligence be voluntary; moreover, for the negligence to be voluntary in this way it suffices that the will can and is bound to avoid it, by exciting the intellect to an act of solicitude opposed to it, and yet does not avoid it: but for this an act of will is not necessary whereby the negligence itself is willed: for St. Thomas, 2. quaest. 54. says, That negligence arises from a certain remission of the will, through which it happens that reason is not solicitous to perceive those things which it ought, or in the manner in which it ought. And consequently for culpable negligence no act of will is required whereby it be willed.

Then, if the will of the angel could not suspend such an act of conversion to God, it follows that it was necessitated to positing it: therefore in positing that act the angelic will was not free, nor was that act voluntary, and consequently it could not be meritorious: but this consequent they themselves, the Adversaries, deny as false; wherefore they must confess that that act was free, and shortly afterwards could have become sinful through the omission of its production. But as to the example of Christ the Lord, which they adduce in confirmation of their response, I say it is not to the purpose, seeing that Christ the Lord could not sin either in the first or in any other instant of his life: both because he was the first and prince of those confirmed in grace: and because he was gifted with the intuitive vision of God: and finally because he had his humanity united hypostatically to the Word: but the angel in the first instant of his creation enjoyed none of these privileges: therefore from the privileges of Christ, and from his impeccability, the impeccability of the angel in the first instant is not rightly inferred.

You will say 1. If the angel were to sin in the first instant of his creation, such a sin would be attributed specially to God as Author and Mover; but it implies an absurdity for sin to be attributed to God: therefore also that the angel sins in the first instant of creation. The minor is evident. The major is proved: the first operation, which begins with the very being of a thing, is attributed to the productive cause of the thing itself; for on this account the motion of heavy and light bodies to their natural place, or center, is said to inhere in them from the generator, because that motion begins with their being; for immediately they are moved and exist, especially if they are produced outside their natural place. Secondly, the same is suggested by the example of the leg (shin), which if it be born curved and immediately begin to limp, that limping is traced back to the weakness of the generating principle. Thirdly, on this account the motion of the heart in animals is attributed to the generator, because it begins together with the animals themselves. But the reason of all these is, because the operation which begins with the being of the produced thing is like a certain corollary following upon its nature, and so ought to proceed from the Agent and Author of that being; whence that common saying: he who gives being gives also the consequences of being. They confirm it from this, that an operation proceeding from a nature according to the inclination accepted from the Author of nature ought to be attributed to the Author of that nature; for to be moved upward is inherent in fire from the generator, because it is according to the inclination which it has from the generator toward the place above: but an operation, which begins simultaneously with the being of a thing, proceeds from a nature according to the inclination accepted from the Author of nature: therefore it ought to be attributed to the Author of that nature. They prove the minor: when a thing begins to be, it has no other inclination and disposition besides that which it receives from the Author of nature: therefore if in that instant it operates, it is necessary that it operate according to the inclination instilled into it by the Author of nature. — The Doctor denies the major in the place cited above n. 4. First, because according to St. Augustine, book 11. De Civitate Dei c. 3. Those who say the angels were evil from the beginning do not agree with the Manichaeans, who posited that one god was evil was the immediate cause of evil, and another the immediate cause of good: but they would have to hold this if the angels in the first instant of their formation could not be evil and sinners without their sin being thrown back upon God: therefore from St. Aug., even if the angels had sinned in the first instant of their creation, their sin for that reason would not have to be attributed to God. Secondly, the defect of a secondary cause in acting, for whatever instant in which it acts, is not to be attributed to God, but to the secondary cause itself, although it cannot act except with the concurrence of God himself; but the defect which would inhere in the sinful act of the angel sinning in the first instant would be the defect of the angel himself: therefore it would have to be ascribed not to God but to the angels themselves. Thirdly, to that extent would angelic sin in the first instant be thrown back upon God as into the cause of that sin, inasmuch as God for that instant would produce the will, and infuse into it all the principles through whose mediation it could sin, as well as the conditions without which it would not sin: namely, the application of objects, and motion: but if on this account God would have to be called the author of sin, by equal right all sins committed in subsequent instants would have to be thrown back upon him: since it is the very same one who formed the will that sins, and physically concurs with it toward the sinful act, as well as with the object moving it, and with the other causes inducing the sinful act: therefore much more would he have to be called the author of the sin committed in those subsequent instants: which, however, since to assert it is an execrable blasphemy, by equal right neither would he have to be called the author of the sin that occurs in the first instant. Finally, this argument the Doctor turns back upon the Adversaries themselves n. 8. namely, that if the angels could not sin in the first instant without their whole sin being thrown back upon God as its unique author; neither could they merit in that instant; because, they say, the angel could not demerit in the first instant for this reason, that every operation which he has in the first instant is of God producing it, and consequently not his own: but a sinful operation ought to be his own proper act: but a meritorious operation ought no less to be his own proper act than a sinful one: therefore if the operation which he has in the first instant is of God, and consequently not proper to him; it follows that it cannot be meritorious; which since the Adversaries do not admit, neither ought they to admit the other. From these things, therefore, it is established that the major of that argument is false, upon which the opinion of the Adversaries chiefly relies. Whence formally: I deny the antecedent of that proof, and to its first confirmation I say, that the motion of heavy and light bodies is attributed to the generator no otherwise than because he gives them being; for the descent of a produced stone in the middle of the air, e.g., which in the first instant of its formation would fall to the earth, would be no different from its descent during subsequent instants: whence just as the descent in subsequent instants is attributed to the generator no otherwise than because by producing the stone he instilled into it that heaviness which is the immediate principle of that descent: so it would not be unfitting that, by parity of reason, the evil operation of the will be attributed to God both in the first and in subsequent instants solely from this, that he instilled into the rational creature a free will, which will is the immediate and per se principle of the sinful act. It is confirmed. because according to the adversaries, just as the descent of the stone in the first instant is attributed to the generative cause, so it is attributed to the same in other instants: therefore if the same holds of the descent of the stone and of the evil operation of the will, as that operation would be ascribed to God in the first instant, so also in other instants: especially if there were no other causes besides the will from which it might arise in subsequent instants: which since it is absurd, as even the Adversaries confess, they must admit that that example is not to the purpose. Nor does the example of the leg help more: for I concede that its curvature ought to be ascribed to the generative cause, and not to the leg itself; but I deny that the same must be said of all the perfections or imperfections which the creature could acquire for itself by its own proper operation in the first instant of production; for the disparity is very great; because the leg itself does not have the power of producing curvature in itself, and on that account that curvature must be referred back to another cause; but the will has the power of producing in itself an evil operation; and therefore recourse must not be had to another cause. Add that the rectitude of the other leg does not proceed efficiently from the leg itself, but from the generative cause and other circumstances: therefore if there ought to be parity between the limping leg and the will sinning in the first instant; there ought also to be some parity between the leg walking rightly and the will operating well in the first instant: and accordingly just as the rectitude of the leg does not proceed from the leg itself, so neither in the first instant could good operations proceed from the will, which no theologian will admit. The same must be said a pari of the other things they bring forward.

You will say 2. The angel does not have the first willing from himself, but from another: but the angel cannot sin by a willing had from another, and not from himself: therefore his first volition cannot be sinful. The major is proved from St. Anselm, De casu diaboli cap. 13. where he says: If he has the first willing from himself, then either he wills it willingly, or unwillingly: If willingly, therefore that is not the first willing; If unwillingly, the same follows, because before that willing he willed it not: therefore he willed it not to be: therefore he willed something. Therefore the sin which would be in the first instant could not be from the will; and consequently it would have to be from God: which since it cannot come to pass, it follows that the will of the angel cannot be sinful in the first instant.

The Doctor denies the major n. 5. For just as the angel can have the second willing from himself, so he could have the first willing from himself: otherwise there would follow a process to infinity: for, says the Doctor,

I ask from whom he first had willing. Either from himself, through another volition, or without another volition. If without another volition, therefore the will can have from itself a first volition without another: If through another, therefore it must have that other through another, and that again through still another, and thus there will necessarily be a process to infinity.

Whence, as to the authority of St. Anselm, the Doctor says that by the volition which ought to precede the first willing of the angel, St. Anselm understands the will itself in act, which the angel must have from God, on the supposition that he himself could not produce it in himself: which supposition perhaps Anselm makes for the sake of argument. But it is certain that a volition cannot be produced except by a preceding will, and therefore volition must presuppose a will. But if St. Anselm meant something else, he would have to be denied in this matter, seeing that that opinion does not square with philosophical and theological principles. — But to his discourse I respond that the angel has the first willing not through another willing or nilling, but through the very first willing itself: just as a pari the efficient cause has its first action not through another action, or negation of action, but through the very first action itself, whatever it may be. Add that, if the angel could not sin in the first instant because he could not have the first willing from himself; it would follow also that he could not sin in subsequent instants. For I ask from whom in other instants he would have that first sinful willing. If from himself, therefore the same can be said of the first instant: if from another: therefore since, the adversaries say, the first volition which he has in the first instant cannot be sinful, because it is from another, the same follows in any other instant whatsoever.

You will say 3. If the angel were to sin in the first instant, he would sin necessarily; and thus he would sin and not sin: but this is absurd: therefore, etc. The consequence of the major is clear: because if he sinned in the first instant, he could not not-sin: therefore he sinned necessarily, and accordingly since sin must be free, it follows that he sinned, as is supposed, and that he did not sin, because he sinned not freely, but necessarily. But this consequence is proved, namely that if he sinned, he sinned necessarily: because if he could not-sin, it would be either by power before the act, or by power with the act. Not the first, because the angel was not before that instant which is supposed to be the first of his formation. Not even the second, because in the very first instant in which he sinned he could not not-sin; and therefore by that power he could not not-sin: therefore he sinned necessarily. —

The Doctor denies the first consequence n. 6. To whose proof he says, that the will of the angel sinning in the first instant truly could not-sin by power before the act; not indeed by priority of time, but of nature; because the will itself of itself, as conceived prior to the sinful act which it produces, is indifferent and capable of producing or not producing that act; but that it is not necessary that a cause or faculty precede its effect or operation by priority of time, but that priority of nature suffices for both, the Doctor demonstrates: because otherwise there would follow, first, that God himself could not freely will anything from eternity; likewise that a rational creature could not will freely in the first instant, and accordingly it would follow that the angels could not have merited in the first instant of their formation; which nevertheless the adversaries do not admit.

You will say 4. The angel in the first instant could not have deliberation sufficient for sinning: therefore neither could he sin in it. The antecedent is proved: for deliberating several cognitions are desired; for one must perceive various objects and detect in them a varied ratio of amiability or aversion, so that the will pursue one rather than another: but in the first instant the angel could not have various cognitions: therefore neither deliberate. —

The Doctor denies the antecedent n. 7. and likewise the minor of its proof: because for sinning no other cognition is required than that by which the object is known to be a good by useful or delectable goodness; or that it be prohibited: but it is certain that the angel could have such a cognition for the first instant as easily as for any subsequent instant whatsoever. Add that greater deliberation is not required for sinning than for meriting: therefore since in the first instant the angel could have sufficient deliberation for meriting, he could also have sufficient deliberation for sinning.

You will say 5. No one can sin unless he be a debtor of justice: but in the first instant the angel was not a debtor of justice; because according to St. Anselm cited above c. 12. and 14. the angel in the first instant did not receive justice: therefore he could not sin. The major stands, because justice and sin are opposed as habit and disposition: therefore sin privates justice: but it cannot private justice unless justice be owed, and consequently unless the sinner ought to have justice. —

The Doctor denies the major n. 11. and to its proof he says, that if the angel in that first instant was not a debtor of justice, because he did not receive it, it would follow, he says, that one existing always in mortal sin would never be a debtor of justice, because he never received it: therefore of this justice the argument has no force: similarly not of acquired justice either, for that can be admitted in the elicited acts of justice: nor would he who never was just be morally bound to act justly, if he were not a debtor of justice; because he never received it.

• And although the demons at the beginning of their creation were able to sin, it is certain nevertheless that they in truth did not sin in that prior instant. For they stood in grace for some time, but did not persevere in it long; for Christ the Lord says, John VIII. 44: He was a murderer from the beginning, and stood not in the truth. Whence St. Jude says the demons did not keep their principality. They had, therefore, a principality, that is, grace, by which they could have persevered in the received gifts and divine charisms, if they had willed. But their own perversity was the reason that they quickly lacked both holiness and felicity, to which they were ordered. *

Third conclusion. — Lucifer induced the other angels to sin, and was the cause of their rebellion and fall.

This is the more common opinion of the theologians, which the Seraphic Doctor hands down in book 2, dist. 5, art. 2, quaest. 1 and 2. For in the first Question he speaks thus:

It must be noted that the pride of the demons was conformed to the head, the prince of the whole militia, namely of darkness: for the devil himself, attending to the strength, excellence, and pre-eminence of his natural gifts, wished to preside and to rest upon his own authority, that is, without merits and without ministry. But the demons subject to him did not dare to desire so much, but considering the strength of their natural gifts, they wished to rest under his shadow, so that they would not minister, but might enjoy under him a certain voluntary liberty, which they saw they could not have under the divine dominion. Now the angels knew they were made to attain the blessedness of quietude, and to acquire it through merits and ministries: therefore they sinned by pride, because without merits they wished to be blessed, and to rest without ministry, and to fulfill their own will without limit; and all this is to be proud; although it is not a pride so great as was that of desiring to excel over all and be subject to none.

— But in the second Question he explains how the first angel's sin had a certain pre-eminence above the sins of the other angels.

For there was there an order, he says, both with respect to degree, and with respect to occasion, and with respect to duration. With respect to degree, because that of Lucifer was greater: > with respect to occasion, because he furnished the example to others: with respect to duration, because just as it was necessary for Lucifer, before sinning, to have knowledge in time beforehand, since he could not in the same instant have the cognition which is required for sin together with a disordered affection: so in the lesser angels they say there was a delay in sinning, and when they sinned by looking at what the angel willed, and thereafter by looking at his own advantage.

But the Conclusion is proved from various passages of Scripture: first indeed S. Jerome gathers from Ezechiel 31.: All the trees of pleasure, which were in Paradise, emulated him,¹ that the congregation of the damned angels fell through the suggestion of Lucifer. For to emulate is nothing else than to imitate; and so if those words are applied metaphorically to the angels, they signify very well that the inferiors imitated Lucifer by sinning. S. Aug., from Matthew 25.: Depart, you cursed, into eternal fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels. But the devil, he says, is called the one who was the cause or incentive of sinning to others: therefore one of those angels was a devil among the sinning angels: and consequently he who said, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, was a devil among the angels. — But it is proved especially from Apocalypse 12., where it is said:

There was a great battle in Heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon: and the dragon fought and his angels, and they prevailed not, nor was their place found any more in heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, the old serpent, the devil, Satan, who seduces the whole world:

therefore there was someone who first sinned among all the sinners, and induced others to sin and seduced them. The antecedent is proved: there was some ancient dragon among the sinners: therefore there was some first sinner. The inference is evident, because if all had sinned at once, none would have been older than another.

• To these is added that a seducer ought to precede the seduced, and first be baited with the deadly virus before he pours it into others. — All those texts of Scripture confirm these points, in which various names are attributed to the prince of the demons, from which it is easy to gather that he preceded others in rebellion, and was the author to them of perfidy and of rebellion against God. For whoever he was, he is called by antonomasia the devil, and Satan, and perhaps is named by his proper name Beelzebub, prince of the demons. Hence Matthew 25.: those who will hold the left hand at the last judgment will be banished into eternal fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels. Likewise John 12. v. 31., he is called the prince of the world. And 1. Corinth. 2. v. 7., the prince of this world. Wherefore Christ the Lord, John 8. v. 44., speaking of the devil as of one singular individual, says: He was a murderer and a liar from the beginning. Whence one may gather among the demons the same thing that existed among those before the ruin, a difference of order and dignity, whether it arose from the dissimilar and unequal excellence of nature, or from the ordination of God, or from voluntary submission, whereby those falling away from God subjected themselves to that apostate angel as their chief, and suffered themselves to be reduced into order. — Origen confirms this in the preface to the books periarchon, or On First Principles, where he writes: about the devil and his angels, and the contrary powers, the ecclesiastical preaching has decreed that they exist indeed, but what they are, or how they are, it has not explained clearly enough. Among very many, however, this opinion prevails, that an angel was that devil, and after he became such, when he had persuaded very many of the angels to decline with him, who even now are called his angels. *

This same truth the holy Fathers teach, both Greek and Latin; the Greeks indeed, and especially Caesarius, brother of Gregory Nazianzen, in Dialogue 1.: The author of evil, he says, the devil, turned toward malice, drawing with him many of the angels to defection, changed not by nature but by will, led them on by suggestion; who received an appellation suited to his deed. Likewise saint Chrysostom on Psalm 14.: One citizen there, he says, like a lodger, stirred up sedition, and was cast out as an alien, and estranged from God, and with him the demons, who followed him. Damascene has similar things, lib. 2. cap. 4.: The prince of the wicked angels, he says, exalted himself against his maker God, and conceived the mind of rebelling against him. And he subjoins below: Together with him was torn away, and joined herself to him as companion, and fell with him at once, an innumerable multitude of angels subjected to him. — Such is the concordant opinion of the holy Latin Fathers; for S. Ambrose expressly says in Epist. 55. to Demetrias that the devil, because power and dignity, which he had received from his Creator, pleased him, was cast down from heavenly loftiness together with those angels whom he had drawn into the consent of his impiety. Arnobius Junior signifies the same, lib. 2. De Deo trino, et uno, saying: First of all the angels he sinned in his heart, from which time the kinds of all presumptions began then to spring up, when, following the example of no one, he gave from himself the beginning of sinning. Finally S. Bernard indicates the same in the Tractate De grad. humilitatis, speaking of Lucifer: You alone desiring to sit, you harass, as much as in you lies, the concord of brethren, the peace of the whole celestial homeland, the very quietude of the Trinity. Whither does your curiosity lead you, wretch, that by a singular presumption you do not doubt to give scandal to your fellow-citizens, injury to your King? For while he says that Lucifer alone gave scandal to others and disturbed the peace, he indicates certainly that he moved sedition against God. Whence below he says: Lucifer wished to dominate over all the sons of pride, whom he strove to enkindle for the uses of his own malice.

You will say 1. All the good angels were converted to God at once, no other angel suggesting it, nor furnishing the motive and example of that conversion: therefore equally all the wicked turned away from God, with no one suggesting it. — I answer, that the antecedent can be denied: for in whatever way Lucifer furnished to the other rebellious angels the cause of disobedience, on account of which it is said that the dragon fought and his angels; in the same way S. Michael was the exemplar and incentive of fidelity in observance toward God for the other angels subject to him, since it is read Apoc. 12.:² that Michael fought and his angels. — I answer secondly, by denying the parity: for the good angels, through sanctifying grace and through the evident knowledge of their dependence upon God, had sufficient motive and incentive whereby to tend toward God in faithful observance: but the wicked had in themselves no such motive for rebelling; and therefore it is likely that they were excited to rebellion by Lucifer.

You will say 2, with William of Paris, 2. par. De Universo: all the angels sinned through pride: therefore all, not induced by another, but per se and by their own excellence, abstracted and enticed by love, proudly desired something. Secondly: Lucifer could neither persuade them by reasons, nor induce them by error or deception; because he knew they could not be deceived in the knowledge and due esteem of the Creator; nor could he entice them by promises or other objects of concupiscence; because they needed nothing which they could expect from him; nor could they even be deceived in this. Thirdly he adds, because if the sin of the inferior angels had been of rebellion against God, to which they had been induced by Lucifer, Lucifer alone would not have dared to rebel against God unless he had foreknown the wills of the inferiors to be inclined to rebellion against God; just as in human kingdoms no vassal, however powerful, dares to rise up against the King unless the consent of many comes in, and contracts for rebellion precede among them: therefore similarly among the angels it would have been necessary that Lucifer, recognizing the wills of the others, be invited by them to rebellion, or at least that they come together among themselves and treat of rebellion. Fourthly, because all the angels sinned at once with Lucifer: therefore they were not induced by him to sin. —

I deny all the consequences. and to the first reason I say, that although all the angels sinned through pride, nevertheless it does not follow from that that they were not induced to it; for Lucifer first grew proud on account of his excellence: then, expounding to each angel his own excellence, he stimulated them equally to take complacency in him and to grow proud. —

To the second reason. I say that the sin of the angels had some inconsideration annexed to it; for being excessively complacent about their own natural beatitude, they did not render thanks to God for the gifts and excellencies which they had received in the first instant of their creation: for perhaps they were held by some commandment to continue that supernatural and meritorious act which they had begun in the first instant; and Lucifer, too greatly complacent in his natural beatitude, not only did not continue the act begun, but showing it to the inferior angels, and as it were observing that they took complacency in their own natural beatitude, not only he but the others also ceased from such an act; and thus they sinned with the sin of elation and pride. Wherefore when Lucifer solicited others to the evil of pride, he proposed to them no evil on the part of the object, but only in the mode of acting. For he proposed to them the excellence of their own nature, extolling natural felicity and beatitude, with no mention made of supernatural beatitude and felicity; and then, too greatly complacent in such natural beatitude, they referred neither themselves nor their goods to the supernatural, in which there was a certain mode of elation and pride. —

To the third reason. I deny likewise the consequence, for Lucifer and his angels were not rebelling against God as wishing to inflict violence upon him, or attempting to conquer and overcome him by force and strength; after which manner of rebellion secret communication of counsels, or seditious contract and negotiation, usually precedes among men; especially because against God this mode of rebellion was not possible, since no thought can lie hidden from him, which the angels did not ignore. Therefore they rebelled against God by affection alone, which Lucifer could have from his own resources and without the counsel, treatment, or communication of others: and thence he could induce others to a similar or proportionate affection by his own judgment and deliberation, without previous knowledge of their will, determination, or counsel, with only the hope of drawing them into his own opinion and spiritual rebellion. —

Finally to the fourth reason. I say that all the angels sinned at once with Lucifer; because truly the delay between the sin of Lucifer and of the other angels was brief: for suddenly, and in almost imperceptible time, as soon as they perceived the will of the first angel, they at once consented and adhered to it; for if Lucifer had sinned previously with any long priority of time before the remaining angels, since from that sin deformity would have arisen through the stripping away and lack of all supernatural gifts, with which Lucifer himself had been illuminated at the beginning of his creation, and since divine justice had taken notice of him; the other angels observing that, there is no doubt that they would not have consented, nor stood by his side. — From these Alensis infers, quaest. 98. n. 6., that the sin of Lucifer was far graver than that of the others, on a twofold head; first, because the appetite's lust in him was greater. Secondly, because he had before himself no exemplar, since he sinned in imitation of no sinner, but he himself was the inventor and principle of the whole sin.

• You will ask first. — How many angels fell, at the instigation of Lucifer? William, bishop of Paris, answers in the book De Universo, part 3. cap. 8., that the opinion of the theologians of his age was that a third part fell:

A third part of the angels fell, the christian theologians, he says, suppose that the tenth order fell, understanding thus not according to the plain letter, because there never was a tenth order, but according to equality, that is to say, because as many fell as one order contains. They fell, I say, according to them, in such wise that from each of the orders some fell, from all of which taken together the sum of one is completed; wherefore it is manifest that with that intention of order there cannot be twelve orders of malignant spirits, since according to this position of christian sages only a tenth part of the celestial spirits fell, and depraved from natural goodness degenerated into malignity.

Such are his words. Weighing these words, Antonius Rusca, lib. 5. De inferno et statu damnatorum, infers from them this:

Since therefore, he says, according to the mind of this author, there are as many legions in each order of abstract substances as there are angels in one legion; and the number of a legion be six thousand six hundred sixty-six; it appears evidently, if we say that the multitude of the sinning demons rises to the number of a whole order of angels, that six thousand six hundred sixty-six legions of wicked angels fell, which constitute the number 44.435.556.

— But just as these things are brought forward gratuitously and without any foundation, so several judge more probable that only a third part of the angels fell from sanctifying grace, or innocence, and the state of felicity, resting on this conjecture, that Apocalypse XII. 3. says the great dragon, that is, the devil, drew with his tail a third part of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. Yet although it be conceded that by that great dragon the devil is to be understood, nevertheless it would not follow that the discourse is there about his first sin and that of his companions. For it is probable that by those words is signified the pernicious power of the demons, because twisting a notable number of the doctors and bishops of the Church, whom God established in his Church for the instruction and illumination of others, away from the profession of truth and sincere piety, he dragged them over into the parts of error and wickedness. Nor indeed can those words, if they are taken according to the literal sense, be understood of the fallen angels themselves; otherwise hell, and not earth, would have to be held as the dwelling and retreat of the devils; for it is expressly said that the dragon cast the third part of the stars of heaven not into hell, but into the earth. — Therefore it is certain that very many angels transgressed, since their prince was that demon who called himself the legion of the wretched man of whom mention is made Marc. 5. v. 9.; Luc. 8. v. 30.; asked by Christ what his name was, he answered: My name is legion, for we are many. How many precisely there are, no one can determine with certainty, since it is settled neither from sacred Scripture nor from tradition. Nevertheless it is probable that more angels stood in truth, or faithful service, than revolted; for, says S. Thomas, 1. part. quaest. 63. art. 3., sin is against the natural inclination; but things done against nature happen in the fewer; for nature attains its effect either always or in the majority.

You will ask secondly. — Whether the demons preserve among themselves the same order which they held before their fall?

I answer. that the demons properly preserve no order among themselves; for as S. Job testifies, in hell there is no order, but everlasting horror inhabiteth. Nevertheless, since the transgression of these angels inflicted on them no prejudice in natural things, they also preserve among themselves a certain natural pre-eminence as before; so that those who had been constituted of a more excellent nature obtain a certain superiority over the others, corresponding, as it were, to the orders of the holy spirits, although they are diametrically opposed to them. Hence William of Paris says in the place cited above, they must be designated by contrary names, namely antiseraphim, anticherubim, etc.:

Antiseraphim are called those who burn with a greater hatred of the Creator; anticherubim, those who excel the rest in greater cunning; antithroni, those who devote their utmost effort to perverting the paths of judgments and the corruption of judges or tribunals, and who undertook for themselves, or received from the prince of malice, that most pestilential office of acting so wickedly; and you will understand antidominationes, antiprincipatus, antipotestates in opposition to the office of the holy orders. And after these manners antivirtutes, those who bear or counsel the monsters of vices and stupendous weaknesses; thus antiarchangels, who suggest to men the greater deceits, which are properly called crimes. This therefore is the ordering of the Church of the malignant, and of the synagogue of Satan, according to the prophetic words both in Hebrew and of the christian law. This is that most ridiculous ape, ignominious with horrifying deformity, in whose likeness the princes of the malignant spirits glory against the glorious Church of God, as if that likeness were a likeness of the true name, and not rather a dissimilitude of manifest distance and discrepancy; as if precisely to such a throng of the damned and adjudged to eternal torments there belonged any praise and glory, whereas in truth it has any praise or glory only insofar as someone presides over them to torment them; but this is not there, since their very prince is not only in the same damnation, but even in so much the greater, inasmuch as he is known to be more criminal than all the others.

Such are the words of Guiltelmus. — Nevertheless he adds in cap. 15. that the demons, subject to the just judgment of God, are subjected to a certain prince among them, as to a most cruel tyrant, in vengeance for their rebellion against the Creator, whose most sweet yoke they had cast off. For no punishment, he says, is more just for so iniquitous an excellence than the most vile trampling, whereby they are most wickedly oppressed by their most vile prince. But they obey their prince not from humility or obedience, of which there is none among them, but from hatred and anger against the Creator and men; whence it comes about that they aid one another in tempting and assailing men, as sometimes happens among men who, although they burn with mutual hatred, nevertheless agree in the ruin of a third. — So great an enmity do the demons disagree among themselves, with such hatred do they rage, that they do not feel even the least spark of natural love:

for just as, says Guillelmus, it appears in men, that anger and hatred, pride, envy, and other most pestilential passions of this kind so impede natural love, and as it were suffocate it, that scarcely from it does it send forth into act a small spark or the thinnest scintilla of good desire; so you need not wonder if the vehemence of the malignity of such spirits does not permit them to will or desire any good toward one another, nor even to think of it, especially since malignity so occupies and possesses them that almost nothing remains to them, if nevertheless it has left them anything of good affection. And this very thing is manifest to you in men whom anger violently agitates, who while they rage against those with whom they are angry, prevail to think neither of themselves nor of those others, that they are men, nor of the justice or judgments of the Creator. Yet most truly of these it was said in prophetic discourse, that there is no fear of God before their eyes, likewise neither love. Nor is it a wonder if all good affections are lulled to sleep, or even extinguished in them, because with so great perversity they are alienated from their natural goodness, that they could hate the very fountain of goodness, namely the blessed Creator, and still can, as it was said in prophetic discourse: the pride of those who hate you ascends always. But if anyone should ask whether they are moved by any piety or compassion toward one another, since they know the miseries and torments of the others, and by which they are tormented at present, and by which they are to be crucified in the future judgment; nothing else seems to me to be answered in this, except what one of them is said to have answered of himself in a certain apparition, namely, that he never had piety. You now know by manifold experience, that the passions which I have named to you either lull to sleep or utterly extinguish good affections in those whom they have seized, as is manifest to you in the case of envy: namely, that it permits no love of the envious man toward him whom he envies, unless someone should call love itself the natural power of loving, which although it remains radically in them, is so wounded and so impeded that its due fruit can neither be born nor go forth from it. Moreover this power of theirs has the strongest impediment, the torments which they suffer.